Tawa, New Zealand
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| Suburb: | Tawa |
| City: | Wellington |
| Island: | North Island |
| Surrounded by - to the north |
Linden |
Tawa is a locality between Wellington and Porirua in the North Island of New Zealand. It takes its name from a broadleaf tree which was once prolific throughout the area. Although Tawa's most famous tree is a large Macrocarpa with the topiri of an upside down bucket.
Originally "Tawa Flat Borough", then just "Tawa Borough", in 1989 it became part of Wellington City, electing two city councillors, and soon supplied a Mayor, Kerry Prendergast.
The image of the town in the New Zealand public psyche is partially shaped by the character "Lynn of Tawa", a stereotypical lower-middle-class woman invented by comedienne Ginette McDonald.
Arguably Tawa's most famous son was writer Elsdon Best, who spent many years living among Māori and became the foremost Maori ethnologist.
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[edit] Schools
Several schools exist in Tawa, an (uncompleted) list includes:
- St. Francis Xavier School
- Redwood School
- Tawa School
- Greenacres School
- Hampton Hill School
- Tawa Intermediate School
- Tawa College
- Linden School
[edit] History
Tawa Flat was first settled by Pākehā in the mid-19th century, under direction of Edward Gibbon Wakefield of the New Zealand Company. Tawa was originally divided up into 100- and 1-acre blocks, much the same as any other early New Zealand settlement. Much of the Eastern side of the Tawa valley was owned by a single family, until the demand for housing land overtook the benefits of farming the land. In 1951, a Town District was established covering Tawa and Linden. Within two years this had become Tawa Flat Borough.
In the late 1930s, the North Island Main Trunk Railway was deviated through Ngauranga by the Tawa Flat deviation.The main line previously went via Johnsonville.
In the very early 1960s, the Wellington Motorway way built through Tawa, on the Eastern side of the valley. The line of the motorway effectively followed the railway that was already established through Tawa. At this time, Tawa was starting to become a fairly large suburb of Wellington City, with land being at a premium in the steep terrain of the region. In 1962, Tawa College was built on land that straddles the motorway, with the main school campus being West of the motorway, and playing fields East of it.
Since the mid-20th century, Tawa has been slowly but surely expanding, mainly spreading Eastward up onto the hills of the Belmont Range, which separates the Tawa Valley from the Hutt Valley.
[edit] Sources
- Carman, Arthur H (1956). Tawa Flat and the Old Porirua Road.
